Oprah's guards not only ones to assail Indian journalists

Oprah Winfrey's first visit to India brought delighted
coverage by the Indian media. Her meetings
and tweetings with Bollywood stars, her bright orange sari, and her trips to
slums and to the Taj Mahal were lovingly detailed by newspapers and TV outlets in that
country.

Their love was not reciprocated, at least not by Winfrey's security
detail.

Police today detained three local bodyguards protecting
Winfrey after they allegedly damaged journalists' video equipment in a scuffle,
according to international
and local news reports. The incident occurred outside a temple Winfrey was
visiting in Mathura, about 90 miles south of Delhi.

In a video
posted by CNN-IBNLive, it appears that bodyguards lashed out at journalists
for getting too close to the talk show icon. The three guards were released
after writing an apology letter to the journalists, The Associated Press
reported, citing Press Trust of India.

Violent attacks against journalists are common in India, according
to CPJ research. CPJ has documented assaults
on journalists in Kashmir, where clashes between Indian forces and
insurgents put reporters at risk, and in
Orissa, where reporting on industrialization and Maoists has met violent
reprisal.

Worse, 27
journalists have been killed in India because of their work since 1992.
Away from the glare of a celebrity visit, these attacks on journalists didn't
receive the same attention from police or Indian authorities. India ranks 13th on
CPJ's
Impunity Index, meaning that its record of justice in the killings of
journalists is among the world's worst.

The message to Indian journalists? If you're going to get
attacked, don't expect much help from your government--unless Oprah Winfrey is
nearby.

Kristin Jones, a consultant to CPJ's Asia program, is an independent investigative reporter. In 2011, she was part of a team that won a Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award for "Seeking Justice for Campus Rapes," a collaboration between NPR and the Center for Public Integrity. Jones was CPJ's senior Asia research associate until 2007. She led writing on the CPJ report "Falling Short," which documented press freedom abuses in China ahead of the 2008 Olympic Games.

Share

Q&A: Indian editor explains how threat of legal action is used to silence journalists

July 20, 2017 12:54 PM ET

On July 5, Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, editor of the Economic and Political Weekly, and his colleagues Advait Rao Palepu and Shinzani Jain, received a notice from Thaker and co., a law firm representing Adani Power Ltd, that threatened legal action over a story published the month before....

For four months, the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir has been under a curfew imposed after protests broke out when Burhan Wani, a commander of Hizbul Mujahideen, a pro-independence militant organization that advocates for Kashmir's independence from India, was killed in clashes with the Indian army. Journalists have...

In India, online campaign seeks to free press from risk of criminal defamation

October 14, 2016 2:45 PM ET

An online campaign to decriminalize defamation in India is being led by a member of the country's main opposition party. "Criminal defamation can lead to people being put in jail for something they have said publicly. This law needs to be replaced by a modern, progressive law," reads the...

Court reporters beaten by lawyers in latest attack on press freedom in India

February 19, 2016 4:47 PM ET

Attacks this week against journalists covering a high-profile sedition case have heightened concerns about the state of press freedom in India. CPJ has reported frequently on journalists there coming under attack from police, criminals, politicians, and others. Now lawyers have to be added to the list....

As police cracked down on protesters in Delhi during recent protests over the treatment of Dalits, who occupy the lowest rungs of India's caste ladder, journalists were caught in the fray. The protests were sparked by the suicide of Rohith Vemula, a student who had been barred from halls...